AI and automatic translation can help you recover — and prevent — abandoned carts. We’ll tell you how.

A lot of us prefer shopping online solely because it gives us more freedom and flexibility before committing to a purchase. We’ve all added products to cart on ecommerce sites and then changed our minds when we reached the checkout page. And you’re not alone in exercising your right to change your mind on buying something: The global average cart abandonment rate is an overwhelming 70%. And just in the US, retailers lose up to $136 billion in revenue per year to abandoned carts.

With these statistics in mind, let’s examine why shoppers abandon their carts. We’ll also explore some strategies to elevate retail customer experience with AI and automatic translation.

Why online shoppers abandon their carts — and how AI and automatic translation can help

There are several reasons why consumers abandon their orders, but if you break them down into broad categories, limited options, confusing processes and security issues are pretty much the biggest reasons.

Top reasons for cart abandonment among online shoppers worldwide 2022 [Source: Statista]

For example, if an ecommerce site forces shoppers to create an account, the return policy is convoluted, or the checkout process is made up of too many steps, they might simply decide to leave. Similarly, if a retail experience suddenly adds hidden charges or has payment options that the consumer doesn’t find secure enough, shoppers could end up losing their trust in the retailer and decide against purchasing from them.

Most of these issues can be resolved by optimizing the end-to-end customer experience, from browsing to delivery and after; almost all of them can be solved with AI solutions and a high-quality automatic translation platform like Language I/O.

How AI and automatic translation help reduce cart abandonment

From collecting customer feedback on the whole process to analyzing large volumes of feedback and beyond, AI-powered solutions can help you optimize the shopping and checkout process. With AI-powered automatic translation, you can also introduce personalization and add clarity to the process.

Let’s pick some of the most common challenges customers run into that make them leave their orders behind and look into AI solutions that can solve these issues for better shopping experience. 

Out-of-stock items

Picture this: The shopper has found the perfect product in your catalog and added it to their cart. However, when they’re ready to pay for it, they discover that it’s out of stock. 

If your online inventory isn’t synced in real time, you might miss out on quite a bit of revenue, and worse, end up with many dissatisfied customers. An AI-powered real-time inventory management solution would not only keep your inventory up to date, it would also predict demand and help you maintain the right stock levels and avoid overstock or stockouts.

Lack of personalized and proactive guidance

AI can enable personalized communication with shoppers, which could help you build trust with them. An AI chatbot can also analyze consumer behavior and proactively provide meaningful recommendations and support.

When shoppers need clarification, AI chatbots can provide real-time assistance and also offer personalized recommendations and exclusive offers based on shoppers’ preferences. If a shopper has abandoned their cart before or they’re revisiting before making up their mind, chatbots can encourage them to seal the deal: AI algorithms can identify and dynamically target potential customers with relevant online ads. Plus, with automatic translation for your AI chatbot, you can provide real-time support in the shopper’s preferred language, ensuring more clarity and personalization. 

Confusing return policies

Especially for cross-border ecommerce, it’s important that your return and refund policies are clearly laid out where consumers can find them. However, even if you have clear policies, if they’re in just one language, there could still be confusion and miscommunication that sours the experience for the shopper. Not only that, as the processes and product catalog changes, it’s crucial to keep your knowledge bases and help centers up to date to reflect these changes.

An AI-powered knowledge base would point out outdated content and help you stay on top of any changes. The most important part: AI-powered translation that syncs your knowledge base across all the languages. For example, Language I/O syncs in real time and lets you update all your articles in many languages with just one click. This clears up any misunderstandings for the shoppers while also significantly improving their experience. 

A note on security and trust

The checkout process involves sensitive data like credit card details and personally identifiable information. If a site doesn’t exercise complete security in collecting and processing such information, you could lose your customers’ trust. 

For this reason, no matter what payment options you offer and what solutions you incorporate, you must prioritize data privacy and stay compliant with the latest global security standards such as PCI-DSS. When you employ AI solutions and evaluate vendors, make sure that they conform to these rules as well. This is especially crucial for cross-border transactions, where you must follow international laws.

Another important consideration while you use AI solutions is sustainability: Ensure that you use sustainable AI solutions and work with vendors who prioritize sustainability as well. With increased scrutiny on AI technologies among consumers, sustainability and environmental consciousness have become critical to gaining consumer trust. 

The above AI solutions help build more trust with your customers and also collect deep insights. These solutions have become not just nice to have to improve the customer experience, they’ve also become mandatory if you want to stand out from the competition. 

For more tried-and-tested strategies to prevent and recover abandoned carts and build customer loyalty, check out our guide See + Hear + Get Global Shoppers.